KARACHI, July 29: A large number of telephone connections in the city are out of order and affected subscribers are reportedly getting mere lip service at the complaint centres of their respective telephone exchanges.

A subscriber belonging to Buffer Zone area talking to PPI said that telephone connection at his residence went out of order one month ago.

Despite repeated complaints at the respective exchange and ‘18’, the fault was not rectified, he said adding that he was told by the officials concerned that it was a cable fault they were trying to rectify.

He said that after the privatisation, the Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) staff at the complaint desks had become more polite and civilised. But, he said, there had been no considerable improvement in the overall service of the utility.

A number of PTCL subscribers from various areas across the city, including Gulzar-i-Hijri, Gulshan-i-Iqbal and Gulistan-i-Jauhar etc, had similar complaints regarding their telephone connections and the response of the PTCL staff.

Due to the poor service of the PTCL, a large number of subscribers have reportedly switched over to various wireless phone services.

When contacted, a senior official of the PTCL, who wished to remain anonymous, said that the utility was facing hardships mainly due to the inadequate technical manpower.

He told that many of the PTCL’s daily-wagers had not been reporting on duty since weeks, due to non-payment of salaries. He said that now this issue was being settled and the problem of faulty cables etc would be rectified soon.—PPI